Learning to Live
by saywhatyouneedtosay
Summary: This is a House fanfic which picks up where season 4 left us, it mainly deals with the effects on Thirteen but I'll include the other characters as well. Oh, and Amber will live to kick House's butt in this fic. Please review!
1. Chapter 1

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no

**1. Learning the Truth**

_No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no! This was not…no! _

She was positive for Huntington's.

Her mind was screaming, her head reeling, overloaded with feelings: Hate for her misanthropic, bastard boss, anger at herself for agreeing to do the damn test, horror of what was yet to come, profound sadness and a void in her heart not even to be filled with her previously mentioned boss's huge ego.

_Great, 4 of the 5 stages of grief at once, just great. _

The longer she stared at the dooming words, the more she freaked out, so she did what she always did when she was afraid of reality: she sought relief in an abyss of lies.

_The test has to be wrong. I made an error, the lab made an error. I'll just forget about this and live my life like I always have. Nobody has to know I was foolish enough to screw up my own test for Huntington__'s._

Walking through the emptied halls of the Princeton Plainsboro Teaching Hospital, Dr. Remy Hadley shredded the paper with the truth which would eventually bring down her walls of lies.

Already thinking about drinking the largest amount of tequila she could possibly survive, she mindlessly tossed the pieces of the offending test into the nearest trash can she found.

What she didn't notice was the person who had been watching over her since she left the lab.

Mdmdmdmdmdmdmdmdmdmdmdmd

Dr. Eric Foreman, 2nd for the job of egoistical bastard, had always had an unhealthy way of meddling with people's private affairs. This had driven him to stay out of them and eventually not to care. But Hadley genuinely interested him. Frustratingly, she was such a neat box of secrets that apart from her being bi, he hadn't been able to find out much about her.

So when he saw her go into the lab with a face as pale as death and go out with a shocked expression, he decided to follow her.

_Finally, a weak spot! Maybe I'll be able now to find out more about her. It's not like she'll break down if I push her a little, she's tough enough to handle a bit questioning._

When he was about to call her name, and start a conversation which would have been deathly for him, he saw her toss a torn document into a trash can.

_What was that for? Okay, let__'s see: shall I talk to her or search through the trash can and put the pieces back together?_

He grabbed the trash can after reassuring that she was out of sight and nobody else was watching him. Turning it over he let out a relieved sigh at finding out that the paper was the trash cans only content.

_Let's see, is she pregnant? Maybe she has an STD? Here, she's positive for………holy…!_

A/N: Okay, this is one of my first fanfics and I'm so not sure if there are any fans of Thirteen out there….please, if you read this review, I'd really, really like to know what you think!


	2. Chapter 2

2

**2. Still Searching for Some Hope**

_She has Huntington's? Thank God I decided to search through the trash can!_

Foreman was trying to comprehend what had just been read by his eyes when his pager went off.

_Damn, it's Wilson! Did Amber…?_

He stuffed the pieces of paper into his lab coat pocket and his distracting thoughts into the back of his mind.

mdmdmdmdmdmdmdmdmdmdmdmd

While Foreman and Hadley had unknowingly (and unwillingly) just formed a sort of bond which would be the cause of both great joy and sorrow, Dr. Gregory House had finally figured out what was wrong with his best friend's girlfriend. And he didn't like it at all, he didn't even feel the pleasure of resolving a particularly difficult puzzle.

_Come on, it's ridiculous to die of flu pills! I must be missing something; my brain is too much of an ironic-sarcastic mess to simply forget the damn flu pills!_

So he forced himself to think, trying to blend out the pain. While having the deep brain stimulation he had nearly suffered a seizure, luckily only nearly.

House knew Wilson was saying good-bye to Amber now.

_I need to remember!_

Then an idea struck him and he paged Chase.

Not much time later, an accelerated pace indicated him the arrival of the young doctor.

"House, you're not dying! What do you want now? I was in the middle of surgery!"

"Your fault, you could have stayed. But since you can't resist my charm I'm now blessed with your presence."

Chase huffed and was silently lad his former boss seemed to be doing just fine according to the level of his sarcasm.

"Enough small-talk, do ya hypnosis thing again."

"No way, you just had a deep brain stimulation, there are risks and there probably nothing you will remember with hypnosis anymore!"

"Shut up kangaroo, something's still missing and if you don't you will suffer the wrath of Gregory House for the rest of you pathetic miserable life!!"

Chase didn't want to put House under any more stress than he already was, but if he had learned anything from his fellowship, then it was: what House wants House gets.

"Fine, but I'll have Allison here, in case something happens. Now rest till' she gets here, and no more bloody commentaries!"

"My, you're bossy, tell your mistress to hurry.

"House.shut.up."


	3. Chapter 3

_Diclaimer: I don't own House MD, D. Shore does_

**3. Something to Remember**

A short while later Dr. Allison Cameron entered House's room. To her surprise, he was actually sleeping while Chase was watching over his monitors.

She could see that the whole situation was affecting him more than he let on, but decided not to say anything to the orphan although she had her suspicions as to why Chase always seemed to stand by House.

"Okay, let's do this Robert."¨

"This could cause more damage than good."

"But his best friend's girlfriend will die, partly because of House, if he doesn't remember, you know that."

"Fine, I'll wake him up."

"Morning Barbie, morning Ken, ready to do this?"

"We…."

"Never mind, just do it, you already wasted enough time!"

Both Chase and Cameron rolled their eyes, but began to do as requested.

Chase sat down on the chair besides House's bed and began to talk to House until he began to see something.

House was standing outside of Amber and Wilson's apartment, trying to break in.

"What do you remember?" asked Chase.

"I'm breaking into Amber's apartment... yeah, I'm in now."

"You don't respect anything, do you?" stated Cameron.

House:" Shhh, you're disturbing my third chakra."

"What are you doing now?"

"Swapping her lubricant with instant glue, what else…..no wait, I see Amber's unopened flu pills pod. It's on her nightstand, so she must be planning on using them. Means she's going to get sick and I'll have Wilson to myself for a while…"

Cameron:" Still in the custody battle?"

Chase:"You're ridiculous."

"I'm a genius!"

The next thing he remembered left his mind reeling and Chase and Cameron open-mouthed, wearing an expression of shock, joy, frustration and unbelief.

Cameron was the first to speak: "You swapped her flu pills with tic tac's??"

House: "Told you I'm a genius!"

Chase: "She's not poisoned…the other symptoms have all been caused by the accident and her flu infection!"

Chase went to find Wilson to tell him the good news and paged House's team to tell them the good news.

A/N: Okay, I'm no doctor nor med-student, so I may have oversimplified the whole medical aspect, but since it's not the point in this story, please overlook it!


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer: I don't own House MD, David Shore does and he won't share…

_Disclaimer: I don't own House MD, David Shore does and he won't share…_

**4. ****Drowning**** on ****Dry**** Land**

Hadley's pager went off just when she had finally arrived to the bar she intended to get drunk in.

But what she saw in the display, made her make a U-turn and race for the hospital.

It wasn't that she liked Amber that much, just like House said, her situation just reminded her of her own, and she wanted to say goodbye, to witness and learn from her experience, if possible.

It may seem cold-hearted, calculating and any other mean adjective she was too tired to think of, but she wanted to see Amber die in the presence of the ones who loved, respected and admired her. She thought it would, it could, comfort her, give her hope of finding her own circle of loved ones who would go with her through anything and say goodbye when it was time to go.

Tears streamed down Hadley's eyes though, because for all those thoughts, she hadn't really accepted her own fate, and she hated herself for trying to gain strength by seeing another person die.

_And yet another thing to disturb my conscience at night, another thing to drown me in guilt, another wasted chance of seeking forgiveness. My life seems to be a broken record, leading to an end it doesn't want to acknowledge, I don't want to acknowledge._

She drove into the parking lot and dried her tears,she wasn't going to let her boss see her cry never again. Then she entered the hospital and went straight to the elevators. In the second floor, Eric Foreman joined her.

_Odd, why is he so surprised to see me?_

_Damn, the one person I just don't want to talk to bumps into me in an elevator, how cliché is that?_

"Hi Thirteen."

"Hi, do you know anything about Amber's condition?"

"I just got paged too."

"How's Wilson?"

"Devastated, he is with her though, he will be with her until the end, although it may hurt him more than her."

"She is the one dying, why would he suffer more?!"

"He has to live with it longer; she isn't going to feel anything anyway, as hard as it sounds."

"Bastard, how can you want her to go through this alone?!"

"Hey, I never said he shouldn't be with her. I believe he _should_ be there with her, and I believe he is strong enough to survive it."

Just then, the doors opened and they raced towards Amber's room.

Thirteen wondered why Foreman had almost apologized to her, and why he seemed so nervous the whole time they were talking, but what she saw when they entered the room, knocked out the thoughts in her head leaving her with her mouth hanging open, staring at the scene in front of her.

A/N: Okay, so how did you like it? Please review!!


	5. Chapter 5

_Disclaimer: I don't own House MD__!_

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**5. Good and Bad Mistakes  
**

Rooted to the spot she was standing upon, she listened to the unbelievable conversation between her boss and the person she had come to see die.

"…and don't even think that I'm going to thank you, House! If it hadn't been for the bus accident your little trick would have prevented me from going to work for at least a week!"

"Yeah, because you care _oh so deeply_ for your patients. Face it, you owe me…

"Don't even think about it, I'm not stripping for you." Amber interrupted.

"Who said anything about stripping? Nooo, we are going to re-establish the custody rules for Wilson..."

"Would you two please just shut up? Amber, you need to take your medications and rest. House, let's talk outside." Wilson commanded. He looked really tired, but relieved.

"Fine Jimmy, but I won't forget about this until…"

"House. Outside. Now."

Mumbling something about unthankful people House followed Wilson outside leaving Foreman and Thirteen alone with Amber.

Foreman immediately asked her: "What happened? What was House talking about?"

Amber sighed and then answered: "House changed my flu-pills with tic-tac's before the accident, which means that I'm not dying and which has lead House to think that I owe him my life. He has conveniently forgotten that if it hadn't been for him I never would have gotten into the accident in the first place."

"Tic-Tac's…?"

"Yeah."

"Why?"

"To screw with me and Wilson."

"He's…

"…insane, but his insanity sort of saved me, damn him."

Hadley couldn't believe it. And for a moment she just stared…until she heard Foreman laughing so hard, he actually had tears in his eyes.

"Oh please, if you're just going to stand there and laugh and stare, you may as well do it outside so I can sleep a little."

"Right, I'm sorry, take care, Amber."

"Whatever."

Still in shock, Thirteen let herself be led out of the patient's room by her colleague. The colleague who didn't seem to be able to stop laughing.

"Oh please, will you stop? It's unnerving to hear a grown man giggle like a schoolgirl!"

"Come on, can't you just be happy for a moment? I know I can use it, and you certainly do too."

Narrowing her eyes, she asked: "And why exactly would that be?"

Foreman's smile immediately froze and the only thought running through his mind was: "_Oh crap_!"

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A/N: Wow, it's bee a long while since I last updated this! So sorry for the delay, but I kinda hit a writers' block with this story so I wrote other story's first. I plan to finish this now, though. So please, tell me how you like it!


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